Great Expectations that would have crippled Pip. The child prodigy-turned-man supposed to lead a sports-mad nation back to the promised land. A golden generation of players who become unsure of their footing on the biggest stage. A sensation and scandal-seeking media prone to crass headlines that prey on the lowest jingoistic denominator. More all-day sports channels and ex-players turned pundits than you can shake a stick at. A World Cup win from a time that few players or fans can even recall, whose significance becomes greater with each passing year. A foreign coach who was once a respected international, now a lightning rod for criticism when things go wrong.

Ahead of an epoch-defining match against a country with a population less than that of East London, those that follow English football are familiar with all of these. Yet, in eight months time, we could write exactly the same things and they would be equally relevant to Indian cricket. Come February and March 2011, a hundred TV channels and newspapers and blogs in more than a dozen languages will indulge in a navel-gazing frenzy as India's finest attempt to emulate the improbable events of June 1983, when a team rated a 66-1 chance by some bookies beat the overwhelming favourites in a contest that was cricket's answer to Rumble in the Jungle and rope-a-dope.

The great expectations are easy to explain. England may have reached fewer major finals than Greece and the Czech Republic since 1966, but a domestic league awash with money became the destination of choice for some of the world's most talented footballers as the 20th century gave way to the new millennium. At the same time, cricket's financial heart migrated from London to Mumbai, eventually giving rise to the phenomenon that is now the Indian Premier League.

These changes, and the new prosperity, brought preening arrogance and considerable hubris. Not content with the Zegna suit, the arrivistes accessorised with gold chains and diamond studs the size of quail eggs. Players made headlines for roasting, dating B-list celebs and bar brawls as much as they did for goals and match-winning innings.

At the heart of it all was the prodigy. It wasn't some chump on a 20-minute deadline that called Wayne Rooney "undoubtedly the most talented young English player I have ever seen". It was Arsène Wenger. It wasn't some airhead TV presenter who said: "He's better than Ronaldo was at that age ... Technically, he is superb. I love players who can do things with their left and right foot – it is such a rare gift." That compliment was courtesy of Johan Cruyff. And it was Lionel Messi, primus inter pares, who said: "You can see the love and passion for the game in Rooney's face, and I have a feeling he is one of those players who would play for £100 a week because football is in his blood."

When Rooney smashed in that injury-time winner against Arsenal nearly a decade ago, he was the same age that Sachin Tendulkar was when he fronted up to Wasim Akram, Waqar Younis and Imran Khan. Like Tendulkar, he ticked all the boxes on the field. What he lacked was the maturity and gravitas off it. You couldn't even imagine Tendulkar having a go at fans on camera, or subjecting referees to the Rooney brand of eloquence.

Both are destined to be judged, unfairly some would say, on the basis of what they achieve at an event played once in four years. Tendulkar's feats with the bat are offset by the fact that he has yet to inspire a World Cup win. It's not been for lack of effort on his part. Unlike Rooney, whose impact on the big stage thus far has been wholly negative, Tendulkar has relished the large canvas. He was one of the few consolations in a miserable 1992 campaign, scoring a half-century in a victory over the eventual winners, Pakistan. In 1996, when he was top scorer, he played a gem of an innings on a spiteful Eden Gardens pitch before everyone else went humpty dumpty in the semi-final.

At the next World Cup, he missed games after his father passed away, and returned to score an emotional century against Kenya. In 2003, he was again top of the run charts, only to be thwarted by one of the all-time-great Australian sides in a Wanderers final. When both he and India flopped in the Caribbean four years on, most assumed that the story was over. Apparently not. Since then, he has made the most of an Indian summer, scoring runs with the panache and authority of old while becoming the first man to score 200 in a one-day international. Right now, Rooney would give anything for that kind of "failure".

Rooney's task, like Tendulkar's, is not made easier by the fact that those playing around him aren't nearly as good as the tabloids and television would have you believe. How many of England's other strikers would make the bench for Spain, Holland or Argentina? Do India seriously expect to win a World Cup on batsmen-friendly pitches with just three front line bowlers whose form has been erratic at best?

The media doesn't make things easy. The very good are hyped as great and when they then fall short, the recriminations are vicious. Other teams and their players are treated as the support cast in this great drama, the painted backdrop as our heroes and gladiators take centre stage. Nationalistic chest-beating is the default position, whether that's the Sun's now-infamous EASY headline or the Times of India's Karachi Captured one.

In the midst of all this, the foreign coach must wonder just what he got himself into. Life would have been easier gazing at Table Mountain with a glass of Stellenbosch's finest in hand, or plotting to buy a Kandinsky. In many cases, the players they coach have swallowed their own hype and stopped learning. The same men who score wonder goals and hit sixes for fun in a less pressurised enviroment become headless chickens and walking wickets once the global spotlight is on them. And if things go wrong, a certain section will always blame Johnny Foreigner.

Win or lose, both men can console themselves with the thought that it could be a whole lot worse. They could have been on the sidelines receiving coaching instructions from Manmohan Singh or David Cameron, through one of the invisible mobile phones invented by Dear Leader, Kim Jong-Il. Failure to heed the call in the age of the vuvuzela would mean the salt mines at best.